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Woman of many hats leads the Outreach Clinic of Brandon

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Perhaps it's appropos for Deborah Meegan to wear three hats to the Outreach Clinic of Brandon's annual Kentucky Derby Party on May 5. • "I decided I am not going to limit myself," said Meegan, who hopes the clinic will double its sponsors this year. • Multiple wide brim accessories will work for Meegan because she wears a number of hats as an active member of the community. Her affiliations over nearly 40 years include the Brandon Chamber of Commerce, The Tampa Bay HealthCare Collaborative, The Florida Association of Free and Charitable Clinics and Brandon Rotary Club.

She's also a wife, mother and grandmother.

Her primary role, however, is executive director of the Outreach Clinic, a job she's held since 2002. The clinic provides free healthcare for people who can't afford it, don't have insurance, don't have enough money to see a doctor or don't have enough to purchase needed medications. It annually handles 700 un-duplicated visits and provides more than 1,000 per month for myself. I see that is just a real struggle for our society.

Our challenge has always been, people don't know we're here so we can't offer them the preventative care or the maintenance they need to keep their diseases from causing an event that leads them to the hospital. We don't want to be a secret. The other challenge is we struggle with resources. We are considered a local charity so we don't get federal funding. Every month it's a struggle just to keep our doors open and the services going. My dream is to have the clinic shut its doors : because all of a sudden we have fixed this problem. It would be the happiest day of my life.

There's people out there who will die because our society just doesn't have a way to take care of them. You don't have to go to a third world country to see people dying in our own backyard. They are dying every day in our community.

How many healthcare providers see patients at the Outreach Clinic and how do they operate?

We have collectively 150 if you count all the medical staff in the large groups that see our patients. Here we have 15 medical providers who see our patients plus 60 residents that are here every five weeks. Then the University of South Florida brings their medical students. There's a lot and they are doctors, nurse practitioners and physician's assistants.

Our volunteers drive their own schedule. Most of our providers spend anywhere from 30-minutes to an hour with every patient. So they do a lot of in-depth getting to know the patient and their lifestyle and counseling on the importance of proper nutrition. So they can drill down to that level where they are customizing their care because they don't need to be out of the office in 15 minutes. All of our diabetics go through a course on diet and exercise. Diet and exercise is just everything and we really stress that. That's the nice thing, we are not limited on our time.

You have been a Brandon resident since 1979. How have you seen the community change?

A lot has changed. Oh my gosh : explosion of growth. When we moved here, all our friends were in Tampa and they would call us the dark side of the moon because there was nothing out here. There were no traffic lights on Bloomingdale Avenue and State Road 60 maybe had three traffic lights before the mall was built.

There was just land and land and land and I thought it was a great community to raise children because there were cows and horses everywhere. It was just lovely. I moved out here and the rest of the world did too.

You are the first female president-elect of The Brandon Rotary Club. What is your vision for when you start your term this July?

My vision is to lead the club in the direction they want to go and be the best leader that I can be. I don't think I will be the best leader or president that club has ever had because they have a long list of people that went before me that were just incredible. Our motto is service above self. I live that daily because this is what I do for a living so Rotary has been a great fit. We raise between 100,000 every year that we give back to local charities.


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